


Fortnight Gamejam!!!

by fishydip



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - College/University, Crushes, Domestic Fluff, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Eventual Relationships, Eventual Romance, Eventual Smut, Flirting, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Game designers, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mild Language, Mutual Pining, Pining, Slow Build, Slow Burn, Video & Computer Games, Writer Victor, Writer Yuuri, characters ages are somewhat different, yuuri's anxiety
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-11
Updated: 2017-02-19
Packaged: 2018-09-23 15:20:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 14,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9663335
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fishydip/pseuds/fishydip
Summary: In which most of the characters are aspiring game developers. Yuuri is a college student studying game design, despite his rather lackluster track record, and Victor is his idol, a famous indie game dev.the two of them work together on a video game and get to know each other while the project is in development.Victor encourages Yuuri to flirt with him and explore his desires so he'll get better at writing romance, and Yuuri is surprisingly enthusiastic, if a bit nervous about it. Victor tries not to become too smitten and fails miserably... Yuuri is just trying to not make it too obvious how deep his feelings for Victor really go.





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was thinking about how it might be fun to write about yuuri on ice recontextualized as something related to my field of study. Pretty much just to experiment with putting the YOI characters in a context that isn't ice skating.  
> i wrote from my own mininal experiences and lots of research. the concept of a game jam is fascinating to me, and i think a chubby, nerdy game designer yuuri & a slightly jaded but good-hearted veteran game dev victor would be cute. and its a chance for me to throw some lingo and game philosophy around. And write more about these characters that i ADORE <3 
> 
> this train shows no signs of stopping!!! <3 <3 <3
> 
> ah also, the characters ages are a bit scrambled, but not that different  
> and i accidentally uploaded this with no tags >~>;;

Yuuri sat back on the pillows in his dorm bed. He read over the paper flier again.

**“First ever fortnight game jam! Hosted by Detroit University.**

**Entry fee: 30$**

**Sign up on our website!**

**Start: _Saturday the 9 th of January._**

**Meet on the 8 th at 6pm for kick-off and debriefing**

**End: _Saturday the 23 rd of January._**

**Exhibition on the 24 th at 8am at the student center computer lab**

**Meet new game designers, as well as industry speakers and participants”**

 

Today was the morning of the 8th and he’d already signed up and printed his proof of purchase.

 

Yuuri was born in Japan, but he decided he wanted to go to school in America because he wanted to get better at English, and even though the gaming industry in Japan is undoubtedly strong, having connections in America will make for a more valuable employee.

He’s a junior in college. A game design major. And he’s the spitting image of one too; chubby, glasses, and a hilarious amount of video game and anime merch in his possession. He’s made a couple games by this point, and been in a few game jams in Detroit, and even a couple in Chicago over summer break.

Game jams are a lot of fun, and he’s learned a lot from them. Even though they are a little stressful, he's kinda used to them, he still enjoys them.

 

A game jam is a type of event held for game developers, mostly college students and people who are still learning, but sometimes professionals participate in Jams too.

A game jam is a “jam” in the sense of “jamming” in music. To make it up as you go along, to improvise, to work with what you have and roll with it. At a game jam, participants are divided into teams and given a set amount of time to make a videogame. Usually that amount of time is something like three days, sometimes it’s a competition, sometimes it’s just for fun. It’s a good way to get experience and meet people in the field.

This is the first time Yuuri’s seen a jam that lasts as long as two weeks, the entry fee is a little high. But…

He’s on winter break anyway. Winter break is lasting the entirety of January, not that he’s complaining about having no classes.

But he’d originally planned on using the break to work on one of his game ideas. Yet, they were all sitting in a folder on his laptop gathering dust. He was losing traffic on his website, and there was even some discussion as to if he’d release another game at all. People were theorizing that he’d died or given up, there hadn’t been an update from him on any website in more than 4 months… he almost felt tempted to really actually give up on the indie scene.

Knowing his skillset and his field, it was entirely likely he’d wind up a regular old freelance programmer or something, or he’d find a steady but dull job as a software developer or tech support expert.

And he’d leave the fantastic, dream-like and artsy world of gaming behind. having failed at his dream, he could become one of those people who wrote off gaming as childish and immature, lose his fascination in the concept of the infinite possibilities and artistic potential provided by video games development.

He’d never even been that popular. But what little interest there was in him was dwindling. If that was enough to discourage him, maybe he had no place in the industry.

But, even if it was the last game design related thing he did, he had to participate in this jam no matter what, if only for one reason.

 

The big thing is that Victor Nikiforov was going to be a part of the Jam. Yuuri wouldn’t have bought his place in the jam so fast if Victor hadn’t tweeted that he and some of his friends would be flying out to Detroit to participate. It seemed that Victor was attracted by the prospect of a longer jam, more time to work on the game

This was Yuuri’s chance.

 

Victor Nikiforov is an indie savant game developer. Has been since a young age, back when he just made flash games. And he was the reason Yuuri even became interested in  becoming a game designer.

Even as a little kid, he loved all Victor’s games so much, they were never boring, and he had followed Victor’s work since early high school.

Victor just seemed to have so much fun with it.

All his games were so radically different and out there and experimental, they barely felt like they could have come from the same person if it weren’t for the sense of charm, love, and originality that went into everything he did. He did something entirely new every time, every one of his games revolutionary.  Victor’s games were so fun, and so much love and thought went into all of them, it felt like he must have had fun making them, too. And that’s what made Yuuri want to become a game designer.

Victor was almost entirely self-taught, and a design genius. He made games in tons of different genres and he probably knew his way around most programming languages. He started making games when he was young, and just never stopped. He’s only in his mid-twenties, but every major game dev company and team would jump at the opportunity to hire him. He probably makes a good amount off of his games already, like the ones on Steam, but he could make more if he actually decided on a company. But he keeps making his own games. He’s said it’s out of a respect for the indie scene and a desire to take advantage of the freedom it allows while he can.

Yuuri respects him for that. He knows its sort of strange, but Victor is doing what he loves because he loves to do it, not for the money. Publishers and developers are cool and all, but when you're working under the thumb of a marketing team, there are certain artistic liberties you cant take, certain freedoms you can't have. Victor appreciates the art, and Yuuri really respects him for it.

And unlike a lot of other game designers of his ilk, he’s involved in the community, but he’s discouraging of the toxicity and tense nature of parts of the community at large. He’s not an asshole. He’s nice to fans and is always charming at panels and at cons. Ever since Yuuri first heard about Victor, he had always wanted to meet him

The time until the jam would start felt like it was getting shorter and shorter.

 

There, he’ll get to meet Victor, possibly, if only at the exhibition at the end. He’ll get to make a game that will be compared with Victor’s work.

He wants to reach Victor’s level, maybe even surpass him, as a designer. He’ll have to prove his capability at the jam. Victor might even play his game... He may even take notice of it.

He felt so nervous

He was unsure of how this jam would operate but he had already thought about what he wanted to work on. Mostly writing, since that’s something he liked and felt pretty good about usually, but he could use some more work on it. In general, a lot of designers tend to have multiple skill sets, especially if they went to game jams. So, he knew a tiny bit of everything, but he felt most confident working with the more artistic aspects of game making. 

This time, he really wanted to write a good story.

 

There was the sound of a key turning in the dorm door. His roommate, Phichit, walked in and smiled at him.

“Good morning.”

“Mornin’” Yuuri grumbled, he'd been awake for a while, but he hadn't had to actually open his mouth and talk to anyone yet.

“Did you just wake up? You should get breakfast soon; you’ll need your energy for the jam, right?” Phichit asked.

“Yeah… Speaking of, thanks for helping me talk to the ballet instructors about it.” Yuuri smiled apologetically at his friend. Phichit was two years younger than him, just a freshman, but he had way more confidence than he did. And he’d needed Phichit’s emotional support to ask their ballet teachers for two weeks off for the jam a few days prior.

“Oh, that’s no problem Yuuri. Just remember, those conversations seem way bigger in your head than they are in real life. You go there often, so I’m sure they know that you wouldn’t skip practice unless it was important.” Phichit hung up his coat in his closet.

“…Thank you.” Yuuri sighed. Phichit and Yuuri had met through ballet.

Yuuri’s mom’s best friend was an ex-danseur, and she’d sparked Yuuri’s interest in ballet. She also tried to get him into figure skating, which half worked. He liked it, he even proceeded to a few local junior competitions in high school, but for some reason, it never clicked, he never quite found motivation to pursue skating even though he enjoyed it.

It was still kind of a hobby to him. Despite his chubby figure, he liked dance and skating and still managed to be pretty good at it. He often went to the dance studio or the rink to calm down when he needed to think.

The dance class and the studio was how he met Phichit. Phichit was a dance and music student, by profession. He was charming, kind-hearted and outgoing, he was fairly popular on instagram and twitter, and he was a skilled selfie-taker.

Phichit was from Thailand, and he was very sociable, he and Yuuri became friends after chatting in practice over the summer, then hanging out outside of practice, so when assignments for roommates for the year happened, they inquired about becoming each other’s roommates.

Phichit knew that Yuuri had anxiety, and he knew how to help Yuuri through panic attacks and social stressors and make sure he fed himself. Yuuri wanted badly to make it up to him, but he couldn’t do much more than help Phichit with his homework and accompany him to dance practices.

“The game jam starts today right? I’m a little nervous about you spending the entirety of two weeks with some strangers, but you’ll finally get to meet that guy right? Your idol, Victor… what was it?” Phichit asked as he climbed up onto the top bunk where he slept.

“Nikiforov… You don’t need to worry about me, I’ve been to game jams before, and the whole thing is overseen by the University. I dunno if I’ll have time to come back here at all. I’ll keep you updated though, if you want me to.”

“Yeah definitely keep me updated. I wanna know how it goes down when you get to finally interact with your no-homo man-crush.” He giggled.

“sshhh…. Shut up.” Yuuri chuckled sleepily. Phichit knew Yuuri may or may not have a _slight_ celebrity crush on his idol. Phichit had heard quite a few of drunk-Yuuri’s rants and complaints about how handsome Victor is (because he is, that’s kind of a fact that he is exceptionally good looking, and he is not afraid to show it if his social media is anything to go by) and how he seems like a nice person and Yuuri wants to meet him and see if he really is like that in real life, among other things.

 

“Plus, at any time, if you need me to talk you through something or you need some advice, feel free to call me, text me, whatever works, okay?” Phichit assured him.

“ Thank you. I… don’t really know what to anticipate.” He admitted.

“Hey, don’t get too caught up in what could go wrong, okay? Just think about how you’re gonna meet Victor Nikiforov, and he’s gonna love you and your game skills, and you are going to frolic off into the sunset hand in hand and live happily ever after.”

Yuuri coughed through a smile and forced out obviously fake laughter,“ha ha ha ha. Then we’ll break into a musical number,”he said sarcastically.

“Exactly!” Phichit giggled enthusiastically.

“Right now, I think I just need think about not freaking out and getting ready to leave...”

“You’ve got time before you have to worry about getting ready. Why don’t we watch something in the meantime like… oh I dunno…” Yuuri can tell that Phichit has a shit-eating grin on, and he’s about to suggest they watch his favorite musical… again. Yuuri has no problem with it, it’s a nice movie and Phichit always gets hilariously into it.

Yuuri fondly rolls his eyes.

It helps distract Yuuri up until he has to actually get ready to go.

He’s packed a duffel bag filled with toiletries, deodorant, and more or less 2 weeks worth of clothing, as well as a few games from his collection and controllers. He debated bringing his fightstick, but the chance of them having time for fighting game matches may be too much to hope for. Plus, it might get broken. He’s packed snacks and a water bottle, and several bags of various wires.

If there’s anything else he might need, he’ll just have to come back and get it.

 

 

“Okay. I’ll be done at midnight on the 24th, okay? By that I mean, the _morning_ of the 24 th. I’ll probably come back here and sleep for a while until I have to go to the exhibition. You don’t have to stay up and wait for me.”

“ ’kay.” Phichit beamed at him.

“I know you know this, but make sure no one touches my stuff while I’m gone, I’m just paranoid someone will peek at my notes or my sketch book or-“

“It won’t happen, I promise.” Phichit assured him. ”If I bring anyone over I won’t let them touch your stuff.”

“Okay. Okay. Did I forget anything?” he asked himself breathlessly.

“You have your computer?”

Yuuri checked his backpack one last time; Computer, chargers, sketchbooks, notebooks, tablet, all his art supplies and a back up hard drive.

“I think you'll be fine to go Yuuri.” Phichit smiled at him, “now get out there and show Victor who’s the new king of the indie games!” he clapped him on the shoulder, Yuuri chuckled.

“Thanks… okay. I’ll see you in a week, Phichit.” He stepped out, stopping for just a second as the door closed behind him.

No turning back now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> //*the ending theme to Shadow the Hedgehog plays*
> 
> this is just an introductory chapter, next time we'll get introduced to the characters yuuri will be working with or at least, we will by chapter 3, i have to divide up the writing i already have. chapter 2 should be done relatively soon. i just need to edit it.
> 
> just to give you a sense of what to expect, game design encompasses many art forms. not everyone takes the all around approach, but many do. Yuuri (cough and victor) will be focusing mostly on storywriting for the game throughout the fic.
> 
> I'm not extremely confident in this... i've never written anything like this before tbh.  
> if you have some advice, a question, or you spot a mistake please tell me!
> 
> ( >///< )  
> THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING!!


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The kick-off begins!

Yuuri followed the familiar path to the train, to get to the univertity’s computer center where the kick-off would occur.

He’d been here for clubs and classes and the odd tournament (which he always lost), but knowing exactly _who_ was inside that building made it feel like somewhere else entirely.

Victor Nikiforov...

 

Yuuri calmed himself.

He was over thinking it.

Victor probably wouldn’t even notice him unless he somehow brought attention to himself, and that was something Yuuri was pretty good at not doing. He doubted Victor knew who he was among the sea of wannabe game devs that looked up to him.

Besides, the jam had supposedly gotten a significant response despite being the first one, and being not very well organized. That could be because of Victor’s involvement. So Yuuri definitely wouldn't be the only one there who was a big fan of Victor.

 

Yuuri breached the building’s doors and made his way to the elevator.

But what that meant was a bigger pool of participants. So, most likely, he was not going to wind up on Victor’s team.  While working with him might be exciting, it would also be extremely intimidating. He found it hard to write if he had to meet expectations or anything like that, and even if he didn’t know victors expectations, Victor was by definition someone Yuuri wanted to impress. So the thought of being able to show Victor only the finished product and none of the blood sweat and tears leading up to it was a somewhat comforting thought.

The outside of the lecture hall had a table with a check in for participants, and Yuuri quietly shuffled over to the desk.

Yuuri turned in the printed out confirmation email from sending in the fee, the middle aged woman at the desk smiled sweetly and picked up his badge on a lanyard from the spread on the desk and handed it to him. He muttered a thank you and put the lanyard around his neck. Okay.

Yuuri scanned the room.

His eyes were immediately drawn to the tall muscular silver haired man who was sitting in the front of the rows of desks, next to a platinum blond teenager. He tried his best not to stare. But, Victor really was just as handsome in real life as he was in photos. Yuuri tried to casually make his way to a seat a few rows back.

Oh shit… Yuuri started sweating, staring down the back of Victor’s head, unable to look away.

It’s him it’s really him.

Okay, calm down, calm down.

‘You wont have to make any conversation until the exhibition. Just don’t even think about him until everything is over with. Then you can plan out what you want to say to him to make a good impression.’

The crowd around him wasn’t making him feel any better.

Suddenly PA speakers buzzed to life.

“Welcome to the first ever fortnight game jam!” a female announcer started. Audience erupted in the room “thank you all for agreeing to participate! We’ve even got some big names here, so we’re very excited people are showing interest in this event.

Now, two weeks is long for a game jam, I know. But, since most jams are so short, we wanted to experiment and see what might come out of a longer jam. This is our first year and we’re sort of testing the waters. for this jam, we’ve got no real theme or prompt in place, you’re free to do whatever you want.”

Everyone applauded again.

“let’s get down to business. we have almost forty participants. Thank you so much for all coming out here to participate! Now, _the teams have been picked randomly_ , so sorry if you were planning on working with someone in particular, but the teams are already decided. You’ll have 6 to 7 people in your group. And I’ll take this time to go over the rules of the competition.

 **Rule #1** : you must turn in your final product by midnight in two week’s time, so 12:00 am on Sunday the 24th is the deadline. Turn in a zip file with your final game and all of the assets to the submission page on the website; you’ve all been emailed the link. You can turn in multiple files, but the last one you turn in before the deadline will count as your finished game.

I would also suggest having multiple backup copies of your game on zip drives or external hard drives.

 **Rule#2** : you can bring in _some_ outside help, preferably from people outside of the game jam. Check with us first. Most of the game has to be things that people on your team have made. Sabotage, hacking, plagiarism, or sharing of assets between teams is forbidden.

 **Rule#3:** all content in your game must be either original or public domain. You cannot include anything that would violate copyright law in America. Parody is fine, but keep it tasteful. Speaking of tasteful…

 **Rule#4** : the game cannot include content that would rate it higher than an M on the ESRB scale. In other words, no blatant pornography, no real-life violence or actual criminal activity, nothing illegal. again, keep it tasteful. If you aren't sure if something is appropriate, call us or shoot us an email, we'll let you know.

 **Rule #5** : all team members must participate in the development of the game. Agreeing to participate in this game jam means that you must be on call to help with the game for the entire two weeks. You can use the universities’ computer labs at any time, if you show them your badge, security will let you in at any hour for the duration of the jam. But, you don’t need to work on the jam here, as long as you let the moderators know where you will be working, wherever is fine.

And **Rule #6** : be respectful towards your team mates and don’t let any personal disagreements or involvements get in the way of your work. We have to be professional here. If there are serious conflicts, feel free to contact us at any time, our number is on that pamphlet we handed out, if you need any help or have any questions, call that number, one of the moderators will always be ready to answer.

Now, are there any questions? Any problems with these rules so far?”

Silence followed. The announcer glanced around, no response.

“Alright, The teams are as follows:” the announcer held a paper up and started to read off lists of names.

Group 1

Group 2

Group 3…

“Group 4: Nikiforov, Victor;” Yuuri looked up at the mention of his idol’s name,“ Giacometti, Christophe; Lee, Seung gil; Babicheva, Mila; Ji, Guang-hong;  Plisetsky,Yuri; and Katsuki, Yuuri.”

 

“Group 5:…”

Time seemed to slow down for him, but the announcer kept on going, announcing the final team.

If he wasn’t mistaken… then he was in group 4 _._

 _So was Victor_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's somewhat short, so i'll upload the next bit in a couple days :)  
> next chapter is where things start to come together. just a little bit.  
> haha yeah, Yuuri is not gonna be able to avoid victor at all


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> yuuri meets his team, and comes to terms with his situation.

Yuuri tried not to think about who he might sit next to. He tried not to panic about the prospect of sitting with Victor Nikiforov. He sat next to a man with round glasses and green eyes who looked somewhat familiar.

Victor sat next to the green-eyed guy, tossing a friendly smile in his direction.

“All 7 of us are here.” The woman with red hair spoke up, they were all sitting around a conference table.

“Should we start with introductions?”The man next to Yuuri said, and  glanced at the rest of the group members. The person sitting next to him spoke up, and Yuuri tried to keep his cool.

“I’ll start! I’m Victor Nikiforov! I’m 25, I’ve been making games since I was 12, and I’m from Russia!” Victor cheerfully announced. Of course, everyone would know Victor. His projects blew up in popularity every other year! His chipper attitude seemed... somewhat accurate to how he acted during panels and conventions from what Yuuri had heard. But in real life, he gave off a strange energy, he never seemed to sit still or stop emoting. Yuuri could hardly look away from Victor when he spoke.

Victor turned to the short blond guy next to him. He looked young, and really angry.

“Your turn Yuri!” Victor beamed down at the short guy.

“I’m Yuri Plisestky. I’m from Russia, I’m 15 and I’ve been making games for 2 years. I’m really only here because this dumbass dragged me along, but I’m just as good as anyone you guy’s age.”

Yuuri felt his eyes go wide. Only 15?  He must be a real prodigy. Yuuri hadn’t heard of him before, but it seemed like he was already friendly(?) with Victor, so…

“My name is Mila Babicheva! I’m 19 and coincidentally, I was also born in Russia, but I’m here on a study abroad trip. I’ve made a couple games last year, and I’ve been in quite a few game jams, I’m looking forward to working with you all!” Mila seemed energetic and friendly.

“I’m Seung gil Lee, I’m from Korea, but I’m here for an internship. But they’re in a post production phase this month, they don’t need my help, so it is okay for me to participate in the jam. I’m 20.” Seung gil talked in a cold, almost deadpan voice.

“My name is Guang-hong Ji, I’m from China!” the next person in the circle spoke up, a rosy-cheeked boy ,“I came here with a friend of mine for the jam, I just make games as a hobby, but I’ve been doing it for maybe 3 years. Oh! I’m 18 by the way.”

Suddenly all eyes were on Yuuri

“Oh. uh…  I’m Yuuri Katsuki. I was born and raised in Japan, I’m 21,  I’m a student at Detroit university, I’ve been to a lot of game jams since I got here, and I’ve made a couple games on my own, I’ve been making games since I was about 16. And uh… that’s it. I guess.”

A moment of awkward silence. Yuuri felt cold sweat run down his forehead.

“I’m Christophe Giacometti, but just call me Chris. I’m 23, I’m from Switzerland, but I’ve been living here for work for a while. I’ve never been to a jam before, but I have plenty of experience. I’ve been making games since I was 17.” Yuuri had heard of Chris, actually. He’s pretty sure he made a lot of porn games at one point, then started making more… approachable games, alongside the porn, and now he was working for a local dev team, but he was still active in the indie scene.

 

“Well, excellent! I already know a few of you, but there are new faces too!” Victor smiled. “Starting off in a group jam where not everyone is familiar can be a little awkward, but we should start planning as soon as possible to get the pre-production over as soon as we can! Get the work out of the way now and make friends later!” Yuuri sighed with relief, Victor was right, group projects can be awkward. Somehow Victor acknowledging how awkward it could be made it feel just a little less awkward. Maybe it was just because of how cheery and energetic Victor was being, carrying the rest of the group through the startup with his energy.

“No one here is from America, yet we all somehow wound up here, huh?” Chris chuckled, looking around at the group. Actually yeah… that’s weird.

“Hey, wait, there's two ‘yuri’s “ Guang-hong noticed, looking between the two of them.

“Yeah, it’s gonna be difficult to distinguish them.” Chris said. “We should come up with nicknames. If you needed a nickname, what would you pick?” he turned to the Russian Yuri.

“Tiger,” Yuri answered almost immediately, entirely serious.

“ No…” Chris chuckled. “Japanese Yuuri, do you have any ideas for a nickname for Russian Yuri? Something that won’t be too confusing?”

Yuuri felt all eyes turn to him.

He looked at Yuri, who was glaring and mumbling about how he didn’t need a nickname. Wait a second… something about him looked vaguely familiar.

“Actually, Yuri looks like this celebrity my sister really likes. I think he was a member of a Japanese boy band? He had blond hair just like yours.” Yuri raised a suspicious eyebrow at him. “I forget his name… all I remember is it ended with ‘o’. So maybe ‘Yurio’?” he shrugged.

“Yurio, Yurio, Yurio. That's good...” Victor remarked and snapped his fingers. Yuuri tried not to panic over something dumb like _Victor reacted to a thing that he said_.

“What? No! Why don’t _you_ get a nickname?! What about you?!” Yuri pointed an accusing finger in Yuuri’s direction. “What’s _your_ nickname?”

Yuuri blinked, thinking for a second.

“Well, my family used to call me katsudon…” He smiled nervously. Katsudon had always been his favorite food, and when he was little he’d ask for it at every chance he got. So his family had occasionally called him katsudon to tease him.

“Katsudon?” Mila raised an eyebrow at him.

“It’s uh… A pork cutlet bowl, deep fried pork over rice with onion and egg, my favorite food.”

“See, that’s a nickname.” Yuri turned a menacing gaze to Victor. “Let me use my real name!”

“It’s cute, but we really only need one of you to have a nickname, and Yurio is less of a jump from Yuri,” Victor flashed a heart-shaped smile, patting Yuri on the back, “so congratulations, you are, from this point forward, ‘Yurio’!”

“That’s not my name!” the 15 year old seethed. Victor and the teenager reminded Yuuri of siblings, or something along those lines.

“All in favor, raise your hand!” Victor ignored Yuri(o) and put his hand up, Mila, Chris, Guang-hong, and Sueng Gil casually raised their hands. Yuuri flinched and raised his hand up hesitantly, not wanting to stand out too much, but also not wanting to incur the teenager’s wrath.

“Then it’s settled!” Victor slapped the table cheerfully, as if banging a gavel, ignoring Yurio’s swearing and complaining beside him. “One of those pork cutlet bowls sounds nice right now though, it sounds delicious.”

“It really is.” Yuuri flushed just slightly. The first time he managed to directly address Victor, and he was talking about food.

“If we start talking about food we won’t get anything done. But seriously I am so hungry. Can we go out for food once we finish planning?” Mila chuckled.

“That might be a good idea since we’re going to have to crunch through the pre-production phase.” Seung gil said. “Better to have food in our systems than to be distracted by how hungry we are.”

Yuuri assumed that by “crunch” Seung gil meant "time crunch", rushing to meet a deadline. But it was a little confusing to hear that term in reference to the early production phases, and also so close to a discussion about food. Usually crunches happen near the end of the production.

“In that case, let’s get the planning done with as soon as we can! Let’s talk about each of our skills and what we want to do for this jam! The role we want to have in this production, sound good?” Victor beamed at everyone. “First of all, does anyone have any genre, game idea, or anything they desperately want to do?”

 

Silence.

“Perfect! Cause I want to make something like an otome game!” Victor announced. Yuuri's eyes went wide.

Otome is sort of a strange genre! Not like anything Victor had ever done before, it didn't really seem his style. But Yuuri was planning to be a writer, so that would mean a significant workload for him… Otome games are often the same as visual novels, which is pretty much a book or comic in the form of a game.

“Otome? As in like a dating sim?” Chris asked.

“A dating sim? That sounds like fun!” Guang-hong perked up.

“Recently I’ve been playing a lot of visual novels,” Victor explained “I’ve never done anything in that style, but I think it might be fun, relatively easy to program, and we’ll have a lot of creative freedom as to what we can do with it. The project might not be very code-heavy, but we have a lot of time, and I really really wanted to work on storywriting.”

“As long as we have enough people on this team who are willing to do writing and art, I don’t have a problem with a visual novel game.” Seung gil mused.

Yuuri thought about it. He’d played otome games and visual novels before. It was an interesting medium. Not quite a game but not quite anything else. But some VNs were more involved than others, so Victor could have a bunch of different stuff in mind.

Well, Yuuri wanted to work on writing for this jam anyway. A writing and art heavy project would ensure he’d get that, but he wouldn’t have much down time.

“Otome game sounds good but… exactly how far are we going in terms of how much gameplay? Do you  have an idea?” Yuuri asked tentatively.

“haven’t thought much about it. I think it will depend on what our programmers are capable of. I think we should have a good amount of player involvement though. Weather that means having a lot of dialogue options or including different types of gameplay, I think we can decide that later, what do you all think?” said Victor.

“Well, I wanted to work on primarily programming, so what engine are we using?” Mila asked.

“If it’s just a visual novel we could use Game Maker or Stencyl.” Yurio said. “It would depend on the languages you know.”

“If everyone else who wants to help program is ok with it, we should go with Game Maker. I know GML, and if you don’t, it’s easy to pick up.” Mila smiled calmly, leaning back.

GML is the programming language for a game making program simply titled Game Maker, the Game Maker Language. Game Maker was pretty versatile, and easy to use. Yuuri had used it often.

“Game Maker would probably be fine. We could even have both 2D and 3D gameplay! Does that sound good?” Victor asked everyone. “So we’ll make a visual novel dating game. We’ll talk about how in depth we want to get after we assign roles. Everyone make a request, ok?

As for me. writing takes up the bulk of Visual novel's appeal, and I think I just want to write. I'll oversee the project too, work on a little of everything, some programming or UX help, and maybe participate a little in UI construction . But I’ll be primarily focusing on the writing.” Victor looked to Yurio.

“I’ll work on programming. I’m good at GML. But I can work on whatever else if you need me to, like art and UI design… and I may help with writing a little.” Yurio said.

“I already said, I want to work on programming. So I’ll be lead programmer! But if we need some art, I can do that too, and I can do some UX stuff or design, but I’ll spend most time programming.” Mila said.

“In previous game jams, I find that the team often benefits from having someone take on a “producer” role, who plans the workflow and makes sure things are getting done on time. I enjoy this role, and I’m usually good at making a plan and keeping everyone on task. I’ll also assist with programming whenever i have no planning to do.” Seung gil explained before turning to Guang-hong.

“For this jam, I’d planned to work mostly on art. Some on general design, programming, maybe some UI and music too…” Guang-hong smiled, “I’m kinda fine with whatever, but visual art is my preference."

“As for me, I want to focus on general design. I’m good at art and animation, so I’ll work in that area too. Oh, I also can make some music. I wonder… I may be able to call up some friends to provide voice talent.” Chris shrugged. "If we go that far."

“I…” Yuuri thought. “I want to focus on writing. I’ll help with coding and art whenever I can too. I can also make music. But… I wanted to work on writing and music the most.”

Victor shot him a giant smile, making eye contact, Yuuri's heart clenched nervously. what? Did Yuuri say something weird?

“Sounds like we have a plan!  We have writers, programmers, artists, animators, musicians, planners, and designers. Now, let’s break for food!” Victor said, almost desperately everyone stood up and gathered their things. “There’s this nice family restaurant down the street from here that I went to yesterday, if we’re just grabbing a bite, let’s go there!”

“That damn place? Again?” Yurio groaned.

“Sounds good, Vitya!” Mila clapped Victor on the back cheerfully “Let’s all load up on genuine American processed food!”

Victor laughed in response and Yuuri was quietly thankful that he got to hear it. He was a little nervous about this.

He zipped up his jacket. Whatever Victor worked on, there would be high expectations. He didn’t know if he could live up to them. Maybe he shouldn’t have gone through with asking to focus on writing… The rest of the group was chatting, Victor chuckling at something Chris said, Yuuri quietly tagged just behind the group as they headed out the door.

He watched the back of their heads as they chatted with each other energetically, with him left behind.

 

The thing that hurt him though, was how familiar this situation was.

This was… probably how it was going to be.

 

This was how pretty much every game jam went.

 

Even if they worked well together, Yuuri had a hard time reaching out to people, he was slow to open up. Everyone else would bond and laugh and become friends, and he’d just kind of be there... working hard but not really clicking with any of them…

And he felt very alone in the crowd.

 

 

Suddenly a hand wrapped around his arm and held him back from leaving with the group, they started to walk off without him. The head of shining silvery hair walked further away from him...

 

“K-Katsuki Yuuri!!!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whew ok. 
> 
> i like this length of chapter better than the other two chapters. maybe i'll post even longer chapters in the future. i think i suits a slow-burn story better. but it's kinda too late for me to go back and combine the last two chapters into one, huh? > v >;;
> 
> if there was some lingo or something in this story that you don't get, let me know! i'll put a brief explanation in these notes. ^ v ^
> 
>  
> 
> There's not much interaction between yuuri and victor in this chapter, they just met in this AU and we haven't really established a reason for them to talk much, but i promise, Victor will make himself relevant very very soon... 
> 
> also update, i'm changing the rating to mature at some point, later on and i might move it up to explicit.  
> i'm writing this out of order and i wrote something... pretty steamy? that comes up further down the line. look forward to it!
> 
> THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING!!!


	4. Chapter 4

He turned around to the source of the voice. The one who had grabbed onto his arm was a young boy, maybe a teenager, with wide eyes and a pink blush on his cheek. He had blond hair with half of his bangs dyed red. He spoke in Japanese.

“I’m Minami Kenjiro from group two! And I know you can’t give me too much help but I- I really REALLY love your work! ‘Classical Chaos’ is the best RTS I’ve ever played! And—“ He was talking at a mile a minute, enthusiasm oozing from every pore, a tick away from literally bouncing off the walls.

Yuuri panicked.

“I- I have to…” Yuuri was going to lose the group…

“I wanna ask you a question!” Minami pleaded.

“What’s going on?” Someone behind Yuuri asked.

Victor was now looking from Yuuri to Minami curiously. Yuuri gulped nervously when Viktor’s blue eyes met his. Noticing Victor was listening, as well as other people around them, Minami switched to English.

“Please! Can you tell me how you programmed the shifting maze bit in that demo you released last April?!- That was so cool by the way! I hope the final product comes out soon- or whenever it’s ready! Please!- I wanted to do something like that but I don’t have any idea where to start!”

“I…” He stood frozen between his idol, watching in confused bewilderment, and an enthusiastic fanboy, demanding help with a rather complicated programming task… one that Yuuri had accomplished in a rather nebulous fashion that he wasn’t particularly fond of. Part of the reason that demo had been sitting mostly untouched was how messy the programming was already, even though it wasn’t that long

… What on earth was he supposed to do?!  Ignore Victor and try his best to help? He wanted to sink into the floor. He wanted to fall out of existence. He wanted to wake up and realize it was all just a dream.

Suddenly, there was a hand on his shoulder, Yuuri jumped in surprise, and Victor’s cheery smile came into view.

“You should help him!” Victor said. Yuuri blinked stupidly at his idol, gaping at him.

 

“Also can I have an autograph?” Minami whispered in the silence as Yuuri tried to comprehend his situation. Yuuri turned back to him.

“I- uh, Victor’s?”

“No, yours! Can you help?”

“…The programming for that wasn’t very good… you’d— probably be better off if you tried it yourself“

“There’s no way, I’m not as good at it as you, I’d never figure it out! If you don’t want to show me just say it!”

Yuuri thought about it for a moment. This kid…

“Go on, Yuuri, clearly you _can_ show him what you did.” Victor said, quirking an eyebrow at him. “I’ll wait for you,” Yuuri felt like Victor might be concealing something, like he was testing him. 

“I… uh… I guess I can write it out in pseudocode. Would that be ok?” Yuuri scratched his neck and smiled at Minami. Minami gasped, you’d think he’d just won the lottery, he looked so elated… over such an unremarkable programmer agreeing to help him?

“That would be PERFECT! Thank you so MUCH!” Minami grabbed Yuuri’s hand and squeezed.

Yuuri then spent a couple minutes writing down pseudocode, in other words, a summary of how he’d coded it, and mapping out functions and asking Minami about what he wanted to use it for so he could give some advice about how to code it better. A few other members of Minami’s group gathered around to listen to the explanation.

 

Yuuri actually forgot that Victor was waiting...

He noticed Victor standing by the door watching him as he was leaving, and filled with dread, but then Minami called him again.

“WAIT WAIT, Yuuri your autograph!” Minami shouted. Yuuri panicked, but when he looked to Victor, Victor smiled and nodded his head. So he hesitantly turned back to Minami.

He ended up signing a couple autographs…

He was sweating from wearing his jacket indoors, and Victor was waiting, he glanced at the clock. Fuck. That took nearly twenty minutes… and Victor had been waiting the whole time. He walked tentatively up to Victor, too guilty to even look at him.

 

“S-sorry about that.”

“Don’t be sorry!” Victor sounded amused and cheerful “You didn’t say you were famous! You have cute fans!”

Yuuri finally got the courage to look Victor in the eye… he really actually didn’t look all that mad. Was he just faking it? Victor beckoned for him to follow, and he walked out the door trailing just behind him “It took a while, so we’ll have to catch up with the others.”

“I’m… I’m so sorry.” Yuuri hung his head, looking only at his feet.

“Don’t be, it was a charming exchange. That did make me curious about your work though… if you’ve got such a passionate fanbase, you must be something special.” He mused. “I’ll have to check out your work.”

“I mean… n-not really. I’m not- you don’t have to…” Yuuri spluttered, he nearly ran into the wall. He’d never really thought he had much of a fanbase, or he was anything special, Victor was clearly getting the wrong idea.

Victor pushed the elevator button. “Do you not want me to see it?” Victor chuckled.

“Well it’s… it doesn’t compare to yours…” he decided to say with a nervous giggle.

“Hmm? I guess I’ll have to see.” Victor said, Yuuri felt fear fill him. “If you really are that talented, you’ll be quite a force for our team.”

Yuuri decided to speak again, if Victor was seriously going to see his work, and judge it, he had to go in with low expectations, that was Yuuri’s best bet.…

“Honestly… I’m really surprised he knew who I was but not you… I’m pretty run-of-the-mill as indie devs go. Maybe it’s just ‘cause I’m also from Japan.” They got on the elevator. Victor pressed the button for the lobby floor.

“That can’t possibly be the only reason. Clearly he looks up to you.”

“ I don’t know about that. I’m really nothing special.”

“Is it really unbelievable that he looks up to you?” Victor asked. Victor was speaking with a chipper inflection, but something just under the surface sounded harsh and brutal. “I don’t understand how you’re motivating yourself if you think you can't inspire people.”

Ouch.

“I… I’m sorry.” It felt like Victor had just pulled out his guts… Yuuri didn’t have much motivation either way… Really his only motivation was his love for games and his desire to create... well... that and he wanted to be as good as Victor.

“It’s no use being sorry. Have more faith in your work.” Victor nudged him. Playfully, maybe?

“… I just have a hard time having faith in myself in general.” Yuuri mumbled glumly, Victor didn’t respond. Yuuri flushed. “S-sorry, I got a little too…” Victor didn’t need to hear Yuuri dispense his issues…

“It’s okay. That might be important for me to know...” at that Victor’s tone changed just slightly, he looked away and tapped his lip with his finger. Yuuri raised his eyebrows, he had no idea why that might be. They were working on a game together, but it wasn’t his job to manage Yuuri’s confidence.  Victor continued “We’ll be working together, so it’s good to know your strengths and weaknesses so I can know what I can or can’t rely on you for.” Viktor was grinning, Yuuri felt a little like Victor had just stabbed him.

“Don’t worry about it too much though, this is a good team. Among the people I know on this team, they’re good people and hard workers. Well, Yurio’s a little rough but he means well, I promise. I’m sure you’ll do fine working with them.”  Victor assured him.

Yuuri looked up at Victor, his words were somewhat comforting, this conversation was kind of a roller coaster of emotions… “Thank you.” He said sincerely.

“Seriously though would you mind if I looked through your work? Should I tell you my opinion?” Victor turned a heart shaped smile on him.

“You can look, I guess, it’s on my website… it should come up if you google me. But don’t tell me your opinion…” ‘let me have my blissful ignorance of your opinion of me.’ he pleaded silently.

They got off on the lobby floor and started to walk to the restaurant.

“Sounds good.” Victor said, “The others must have went ahead to the restaurant.” Yuuri felt guilt wash over him.

“I’m sorry. You… You didn’t have to wait. I held us back for so long.”

“I wanted an excuse to talk to you anyway.” Victor shrugged, pushing his bangs out of his face for a second. Yuuri nearly gasped, he had to remind himself to keep walking. His mind took that statement in a thousand directions at once. He was positive that he was blushing. What on Earth was Victor talking about? “We’ll be working on the writing together, after all, we’ll have to talk eventually.” Viktor remarked cheerfully.

“… Y-yeah.”  Yuuri shivered, only half comprehending what Victor said.

“What was that demo he was talking about?” Victor asked. ”Your fan?”

“Oh um… it was a concept I’d been working on for a 2D horror RPG. The bulk of it was a maze that was somewhat randomized, and the paths would like, move and stuff. It was just an idea, when I did it I was proud of myself, but in retrospect it was sort of dumb.” Yuuri laughed nervously.

“How’s the rest of it going?”

“I kind of hit a dead end with it. I don’t think I have the talent to continue it, the concepts were a little too ambitious to execute on my own.”

Victor smiled “You could always just wing it. That’s what I do if something’s too complex.”

“...What?”

“Oh yeah! ‘The Swollen Sun’ was supposed to be way cooler than it turned out. I’m still kind of embarrassed at the result. It was going to be way more complicated and intricate; I was going to have like, paper birds that could eat you. I tried to write an AI for it, it didn’t work.”

“Embarrassed?” Yuuri swallowed “I thought it was awesome…”

“See? Just because it doesn’t match what I wanted, It doesn’t mean it’s bad or not worth making. I think every piece of art has its place, you know?” Yuuri stored that in his brain to think over later. “Also… I suspected you were a fan of mine, but that confirms it. You get flustered at everything I say, and you think my worst game is ‘awesome’” Victor laughed jovially.

Yuuri wanted to dive into the pavement. Victor noticed how starstruck Yuuri was _all along_?! He got defensive, he knew he shouldn’t but he did.

“Well, I think everyone in the jam is probably your fan to some extent, it’s not just me!”

“ Maybe not, but I’m happy to be working with a fan. As I said, knowing there are people who like what I do motivates me to keep going.” Victor patted Yuuri on the head. Yuuri could have sworn his insides melted in embarassment. “Since you’re on the writing team with me, and this project is long so we’ll be going pretty in depth with the writing, we should be open about our creative processes so we can help each other out. So, let’s work together to make this game fantastic, da?”

Yuuri looked up at him.

Writing team?

He supposed that was true. Viktor had said he wanted to primarily work on writing. And that was what Yuuri wanted to do too. But Victor wanted to work on writing as a team?

 

“Are you… sure you’re okay with sharing the writing job with me? You don’t know me, at all...”

“Well, we’ll see what happens after I take a look at your work, I’ll see if you are capable of the sort of thing I want to accomplish.” Yuuri flinched as if hit by a weapon, so he wasn’t out of the fire yet… “but, you seem like an interesting person. I don’t know you, but this game jam is going to last for two whole weeks, so it doesn’t mean I can’t get to know you! So, from here on out, let’s get along!”

 

Viktor held out a hand to him, Yuuri glanced at Viktor’s smile.

Viktor was… all at once similar and very different from how he had imagined him.

There was a gap between what he thought he knew and the Victor he had met today. Yuuri felt as though Victor’s actions were somehow hiding something. 

Victor wasn’t quite the charming, affable guy he’d heard about. He had some rather obvious habits, actually, like being incredibly blunt, and he couldn’t help but be a little frustrated that he didn’t know how to interpret Victor’s actions.

Victor on twitter was a celebrity, but as he looked at the outstretched hand Victor was offering, Yuuri realized his idol was just 'Victor', another game designer who was as passionate as he was; just a teammate in a game jam. Treating him like a god or a celebrity the whole time would mean nothing would get done.

 

In order to understand the situation he was in, he would have to get to know the man in front of him.

Something was moving in his chest, like a switch had been flipped.

He reached out and took Victor’s hand, shaking it.

“I look forward to working with you.” Yuuri said.

“How would you say it in Japan?” Victor smiled wide and tilted his head curiously.

“Uh…　よろしくお願いします.”

“Yoroshiku onegai shimassu!” Viktor repeated enthusiastically, to the best of his ability. Yuuri smiled at his effort.

“Close enough.” He chuckled. Viktor beamed at him.

Viktor led him into the diner where they would meet with the others. Yuuri felt nervous, but he felt just slightly more grounded than he had a half hour ago.

Then again nothing that happened tonight was turning out like he thought it would.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the hiragana reads: "yoroshiku onegaishimasu" it's pretty commonly used to mean "i look forward to working with you" or maybe "please take care of me" sometimes  
> i also have Victor (and other russian characters in later chapters) sometimes say "Da" which, to my understanding, means "yes" or "yeah" in russian  
> i know all of like 6 words in russian, and most of my knowledge is from YOI  
> sorry for my confusing mix of languages, i know a pretty good amount of japanese, but i dont know any russian lol
> 
> also coming up with fake game names is fun...
> 
> TYSM FOR READING!!!! <3 <3 <3


	5. Chapter 5

“Hey, there you are!” Mila waved them over when they entered the diner. They were sitting piled into a large booth. It was already packed with five people, so seven is sort of a squeeze. they manage to fit though, it's a little snug.

“Where the hell were you guys?” Yurio asked.

“Sorry we fell behind, someone from another team wanted to talk to me…” Yuuri scratched his head.

“A big fan of his! They wanted a little programming advice and Yuuri’s autograph!” Victor said.

“An autograph?” Christophe whistled, “I didn’t know you were that famous, now I feel bad I haven’t heard of you, will you autograph something for me, too?” Chris winked at him.

“I’m really not famous.” Yuuri put up his hands defensively.

“What sort of work have you done before then?” Seung gil asked.

“Oh, I just make whatever comes to mind, really. I made a few artistic type games, a lot of incomplete prototypes. I haven’t actually finished a game on my own in a while.”

“Hm? Really?” Mila said.

“Working in groups is a little easier. But, it means my websites is… pretty barren.”

“Are you sure you aren’t gonna be too rusty? If you haven’t made anything in a while, you may need to spend a bit of time prepping and refreshing your skills before you start work proper.” Victor said.  Victor seems to like those backhanded suggestions, but Yuuri still didn’t know how to interpret them.

“Well, I mean, I make a lot of stuff in my free time for fun, I just can’t seem to finish any of it. I have a hard time motivating myself sometimes. But for this game, I’ll put in my best efforts. I do a lot of writing, art and programming in my free time, so I’m not rusty by any means." Yuuri tried to put his bravest face forward. Victor seemed satisfied with his answer, at least.

“Well then, I’m sure we can all expect great things from you!” Chris chuckled. “I look forward to it.”

“Uh, thank you.” maybe he should be more careful about what sorts of expectations he sets up.

 

A waitress came around and Yuuri had to scramble to order something. He ended up picking whatever looked cheapest. 

When he went to get a drink, Victor pointed to something on the menu, and recommended it to him.  He hesitantly complied, unsure of what Victor was plotting, exactly. The waitress had Yuuri show his ID to prove he was 21 before he could order it.

 

As much as talking with Victor by himself on the way there had been nerve-wracking. Yuuri knew he was so much worse with large group conversations. He never had the guts to get a word in if no one asked him to speak. He almost always spent any group outings he went on just listening to the occasional conversations that started around him.

“So, I’m curious, Victor and Yurio, how do you two know each other? Are you family?” Mila asked.

Yurio snorted.

“No, we’re not related.”

“Yurio and I have a mutual friend, a family friend really. When Yurio started to get interested in game design, our friend introduced us, and I took him on as my protégé.” Victor explained.

“I’ve never seen you reference each other’s work though…” Guang-Hong noted.

“Victor may be showing me the ropes, but I prefer I make a name for myself instead of becoming famous as his student.” Yurio said “So we don’t talk about each other much.”

“That’s right, Yurio’s very insistent on that… It’s sort of cute, right?” Victor and Chris started laughing, while Yurio threatened Victor with a fork.

 

Yuuri felt a little nervousness creep up in his stomach. He felt his thoughts absorb him.

Even if Victor and Yuuri were working together for now, Victors relationship with Yuuri would never quite be like Victor’s relationship with Yurio. Yurio was a long-time family friend, his protégé. Someone who knew Victor well enough that they acted like family. It was a little weird to be jealous of that relationship, right?

Chances are Victor may be friendly with him, but if he really needed a friend to trust with something, he could go to Yurio first.

This was fleeting, temporary, whatever interest Victor apparently had in him, their cooperation, would end when the jam was over. Victor and everyone would go their separate ways.

Yuuri remembered he hadn't even decided what he would even do after the jam. He was leaning towards giving up.

Yuuri painfully remembered all the friendships and acquaintances he’d made throughout his career that had fizzled out and lost contact. He didn’t want to think about any of that now. Did he have any place in this field at all, really?

Everyone chatted cheerfully around him.

 

He was thankful when the drinks came around. The happy conversations were not marred at all by Yuuri’s lack of involvement.

The drink was nice, it felt cleansing and after a while, Yuuri felt the familiar Buzz settle over him. He was by no means a lightweight, but he hadn’t eaten much all day, and he could probably stand to get a little tipsy anyway to abate his anxiety and drown out his thoughts.

“Actually, Victor and I have worked together, too.” Chris said.

“Da! Tons of game jams, and a couple of collaborations.” Victor mused.

“Oh yeah, now I remember! You two were in a Halloween jam in LA together last October! I played the finished product of that.” Guang-hong said.

“That was a good one!” Chris laughed “I’m glad people still remember it.”

“We met through a game con in London, like, what, 6 years ago? And we’ve been in contact since then.” Victor recounted.

“That reminds me, I might need you guy’s autographs or something for my friend Leo, he’s actually the one who encouraged me to come by for this jam, he got put in group one. We’ve been pen pals since we were kids, and we collaborate a lot on games. We’re both pretty big fans” Guang-hong looked excited. Victor laughed.

“Well, tell him not to be shy! We can chat with him when we get back.”

“Thank you!”

“What about you?” Victor suddenly turned to him.

“huh-what?” Yuuri tried to replay the conversation in his brain and find out what was happening.

“What’s your reason for participating in this jam?” Victor just looked at him expectantly.

“I uh…” he tried to think of a good answer. “I mean, I go to this university… I just, I wanted to?” 

“You signed away two whole weeks of your time because you just wanted to?” Victor raised a brow at him. Yuuri flushed deeply.

“Victor don’t tease him, I think the reason he signed up is sitting right across the table from him.” Chris tapped Victor on the shoulder. Yuuri felt his face get even redder, Victor just laughed. Yuuri averted his eyes and took a big swig of his drink so he wouldn’t have to say anything else.

The conversation moved on, but not without Chris throwing him a knowing wink. Yuuri felt his insides curl in embarrassment.

The food ended up taking longer than expected, probably because they had ordered for 7 people, plus appetizers. All the while, lively conversation ensued.

 

He kept seeing Victor and Chris occasionally sneak glances at him, as if searching for an opportunity to draw him into the discussion. Every time they did Yuuri filled his mouth with alcohol so they wouldn’t force him to speak. He was doing just fine listening to conversation, and as he started to feel more and more tipsy, he felt the urge to speak up at some points, but hopefully whatever he had ordered was absorbent enough that he wouldn’t have to worry about getting too drunk.

Unfortunately, he was wrong.

 

Conversation continued. The food was brought over and devoured rather quickly, and there wasn’t nearly enough of it. But they stuck around for a while because a few of the others wanted dessert or seconds. Yuuri was sitting at the end of the booth, so the waitress always noticed immediately when his glass got low and kept offering him more.

 

Eventually , Yuuri was beginning to suspect that he was more than a little tipsy.

He wanted to be a part of the conversation too though, even though he was drunk, so liquid courage fueling him, when he had something he wanted to say, he said it. completely forgetting his nerves about fitting in. And the others egged him on too, intentionally or not, laughing at his stupid jokes, his stories about previous game jams and shitty con experiences.

“While we’re here, should we toss around some ideas. We have a genre, a platform, and an engine, but we should discuss your vision for the game.” Seung gil turned to Victor.

“My vision?”

“In order to keep the game creatively consistent, you should take on a director role so the game we make is at least somewhat accurate to your vision for it.” Seung gil elaborated.

“You’re the one who wanted to do a dating sim, you’re going to do the writing. You even offered to oversee the project, clearly this is going to be mostly based on your vision.” Yurio pointed out.

“Well, did you have anything in mind?”

“Hmm… nothing too specific just yet, I just wanted to tell a story about love.”

“What’s with you…?” Yurio seethed “Get your shit together man, a premise, a theme, an art style, a concept, _anything_?”

“I just said a love story. “ Victor smiled and shrugged.

Yurio glared at victor. Yuuri wondered if Victor would usually be so vague. Based on Yurio’s reaction, maybe not. But regardless, they needed a better jumping-off point to get started.

“I know it’s bad to work with the genre as the base, but we don’t have much of a choice with a VN or an otome game. Are we gonna make something with that kind of structure? And introductory route, a branching point where it branches off into character routes, and a good end or bad end?” Guang-hong asked.

“My instinct is to say we should deviate from that structure wherever possible, but that might be difficult if we only have two weeks.” Chris noted

“How about this; We shoot for 4 routes, an overarching plot connecting all of them. It would be nice to make every route feel unique...” Victor said. He opened his mouth to say something else, but Yuuri interrupted him.

“Yeah, probably the worst thing about any otome game is how samey the routes are and how there’s a lot of repetition.” Yuuri rolled his eyes, just thinking about all the boring otome games there were out there. “Like I get it… But wouldn’t it be cool if each route told more of a story of its own? If we could create uniqueness by deviating in gameplay between routes, that would be interesting.” Yuuri said. Victor smiled at him excitedly and snapped his fingers.

“That’s what I was thinking! VNs are by nature, not gameplay heavy, but we’ve got a good collection of programmers and designers in this team. If we can have differing gameplay for each route, it could make every route unique!”

“Differing gameplay? Like minigames?” Guang-hong asked hesitantly.

“Like, maybe each route has you focus on a different gameplay goal. Maybe we could have something like minigames in each route. But it will get boring if the whole route is just playing one game. Maybe more like, one route will have minigames, another could focus around maybe more of a stats management system, one could have a rhythm game built into it…” Victor took a breath, “is that too much?”

“As long as we keep it simple, it shouldn’t be too hard. Programming a simple rhythm game or a couple minigames should only take a day or two each.” Mila said. “Between the like 3 or 4 programmers on this team it should be doable.”

The topic shifted as the programmers started trading tips. Yuuri knew code, but he was getting to be a little too drunk to articulate math stuff. He downed another glass.

He knew he should be keeping track of his drinks, and maybe drink something non-alcoholic on the side, but he was having too much fun and so was everyone else, and he was too aware that his drunkenness was the cause of his fun-having, so he stopped caring.

Somehow they got off topic again...

“I have had some pretty wild fans come talk to me.” Victor said, chuckling, Victor was a bit on the tipsy side himself. He’d gotten the same drink as Yuuri, so who knows? “Oh, I should tell you guys the story about the teenage girls. That was the best interaction I’ve ever had with anyone, ever.”

Yuri grumbled, rolling his eyes and digging into a slice of chocolate cake, Chris laughed. Everyone else leaned in.

“I don't get recognized that often, but there was one time I will never forget. I was in a café, and there were these teenage girls sitting at a table nearby. It seemed like one of them was kinda shy and one of them was less shy, and she was trying to encourage her shy friend to say something to me. I just let it be, I don’t want to pressure anyone into approaching me.

So then the less shy one stands up and says ‘fine! I’ll say something to him!’or something.

And the shy one says like ‘no, please, don’t, don’t do it!’ and she sounds _horrified_ …

And so the girl walked up to me and tapped me on the shoulder, and I tried to play it off like I didn’t hear them talking about me or anything , she just looks me, dead in the eyes, calm expression, dead-ass serious and says: ‘hey, do you eat ass?’”  Victor couldn’t hold back laughter anymore and everyone around the table joined in.

“Her friend nearly choked, I don’t know if she expected her to say that or not, but I honestly didn’t know how to respond!”

“Oh my god! That’s fantastic! I’ll have to do that if I meet a celebrity!” Mila laughed.

“Well, do you?” Yuuri, feeling bold, turned to Victor “Do you eat ass?”

Victor nearly choked on his drink in shock, everyone turned to Yuuri with wide eyes, he dimly wondered if that was too far, but when Victor put his drink back down he was still laughing and his cheeks were tinted pink. Mission success!

“That’s for me to know, and you to find out.” Victor replied calmly, smirking playfully at Yuuri as he took another sip of his drink. Yuuri threw up his eyebrows in surprise. He did his best to stay calm, but he couldn’t stop himself from chuckling nervously. That wasn’t very subtle.

“Ohhh…” Chris looked between Victor and Yuuri mischievously, “Fill me in on the details later, you two!”

“Gross!” Yurio groaned, leaning away from the others. “Don’t say that stuff in public!”

Conversation ended up looping back around to the game, and Yuuri found himself laughing as he and Victor started tossing back and forth ideas for the story. It was easier to keep in mind that desicion that Victor was just a regular guy while he was drunk. It was easier to talk like this, it felt like conversing with a friend with inhibitions removed. Yuuri felt no fear throwing out every idea that came to his head to get some feedback.

"What if... we had a plot twist where it turns out that two different routes were actually the same person? Like, the character acts completely differently in the routes, but its just because you keep meeting them in a different context each time." Yuuri's only really half serious. It sounds like a dumb idea and he's drunk, but Victor's eyes completely light up.

"That's a good idea!! How are we gonna handle the reveal?" Victor leans forward, totally willing to pick Yuuri's brain to flesh out the idea. This really is just like brainstorming for any other game project with just another game dev. It's a little more exciting because it's Victor though.

"I think it's best to make it casual, like an understated reveal... like maybe in one of the other routes we just kinda find out that one of the characters has like a secret identity or they do something or say something that only their alter ego could do or know. so like the player will put together the pieces entirely on their own, and like, freak out."

"The subtle approach... very very good, I agree! what are the alternate personalities gonna be though? Should they literally have a multiple personality disorder?" Victor narrows his eyes down at his drink. Yuuri shakes his head immediately.

"No, no, no, that's too... I was thinking more like, they are exactly the same person, it's just another side of their personality, it all depends on context, how they act when they meet you."

"They'd need to have different names, look different, and if we include voice acting it's gonna make it more obvious." 

Yuuri thought about it for a second, then he had an idea that made him laugh.

"What if they're secretly a stripper? They'd have a stripper name, they'd dress differently, maybe they'd wear like makeup or something, and they wouldn't want people to know who they are in real life, so they might deliberately conceal their identity." Yuuri laughs, it makes sense but this idea is sort of ridiculous, he could never actually write a character like that, but it's a fun idea. 

 

"What about the major conflict? Should we have a villain?" Victor asks.

"I mean like, this is just personal opinion but don't you think that having an overarching conflict benefits a romance story? I think it's like, the romance serves as a respite from the actual conflict, right? That's more accurate to real life, not that the romance can't also have some conflict. "

"Serving respite from conflict... Fascinating." Victor tapped his lips with his finger, lost in thought.

"So, we should like maybe have a villain? Some person the MC is trying to hunt down or like, someone who's threatening their life. I think it should be more of an active threat though, I think it's kinda boring when those games set up a conflict, but then it totally takes a backseat once the premise is established, you know? Like maybe there's chances you can get attacked at any time."

"But what do you mean by attacked?" Victor's pretty good asking good questions to flesh out the ideas they throw around... He is a talented man. Yuuri chuckles. Victor continues "We can either narrate battles, or have them be gameplay."

"I'd prefer to have them be a gameplay thing, but we may need to adjust out scope to fit it. And there's the issue of what kind of battle system will we use. Before you say turn-based RPG, I think that would be pretty flow breaking, so let's not."

"Oh, yeah, no a turn based RPG would not fit at all. We wouldn't have time anyway. Would something more time based be much better though? Or no wait! We can abstract it down to various puzzles.That's less flow breaking."

"That sounds like a pretty good idea, including cut-away puzzle battles should be easy." Guang-hong interjects. Yuuri's somewhat surprised that one of the non-drunk members of this party is agreeing with their ideas, but even Yurio seems to be fairly accepting of this idea.

"A puzzle game would fit nicely into a VN." Chris notes "Same sides of the brain for reading and logic after all..."

"Is that how it works?" Mila raises an eyebrow at Chris. they go on to talk about design and UX for a minute. Victor and Yuuri continue to talk about writing.

 

"I was thinking not all the routes have to be romantic." Victor mused.

"I mean, that's true, my problem with that is that people will get totally disappointed if there's a character they can't date for no apparent reason." Yuuri pointed out.

"We could use alternate endings then, like maybe a couple characters will have a romance ending, but they also have a friend ending?... Mmm but that might take up too much time. We'll pin that idea for now, though I'd like to have at least one route like that." Victor said, Yuuri nodded in agreement, friendship routes are fine.

"Maybe we can have some sort of ending where you can be friends with everyone and also wind up with one of them? I mean the thing is with most otome games is that one character's good ending is everyone else's bad ending, right? Let's break that." He suggested.

"So have like a totally sweet 'everyone is happy' ending?"

"Yeah!" Yuuri smiled "That can be the true end!"

Victor laughed jovially.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this one took a little while, school stuff happened, you know how it is.
> 
> THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING!! ( ' V ' )  
> I hope you are enjoying it so far


	6. Chapter 6

At the end of their dinner, he didn’t mean to be the one who’d help Yuuri get back, he was a little drunk too, but once everyone had their coats on, Yuuri wrapped his arms around Victor and gave him a hug. And Victor didn’t really protest it. He just observed Yuuri’s every move with fascination.

The others were halfway between teasing them and just letting them have their moment.

He hadn’t really noticed now much shorter Yuuri was than him earlier. Yuuri was able to comfortably nuzzle into his chest.

“Thank you.” Yuuri said into Victor’s coat, grinning, holding him closer.

“For what?” Victor chuckled. Something warm bloomed in Victor’s chest in response to Yuuri’s smile.

“All of it, everything. You’re an inspiration to me, and I’m…” Yuuri trailed off, blinking up at Victor.

Yuuri looked so genuine, so sweet. And very potent feeling was pulling at Victor from the inside.

He wanted him to always smile like that.

“C-come on, we have to get back to the computer lab.” Victor disguised his slip-up with a chuckle, and he shifted so he could pull Yuuri’s arm over his shoulders, supporting his weight. They began to walk back to the university building so they could get to work.

Yuuri nestled at his side, he supported his uneven walking back to the building. Yuuri was resting his head on Victor’s shoulder, looking up at Victor through dark lashes. Yuuri was looking at him like he was trying to see what Victor would do next. Victor didn’t know what Yuuri wanted from him, and it was making him restless.

 

“What?” he asked, finally turning to Yuuri.

Yuuri paused, looking into Victor’s eyes before he spoke up.

“You said before you wanted to get to know me but…”  Yuuri looked up into his eyes, narrowed as if looking for something. “I mean… who are you?”

“I’m Victor, have you already forgotten?” Victor explained, amused by Yuuri’s question.

“No like… _Who are you_? As a person… you’re a little different from how I thought you’d be.”

Victor felt an old, distant hurt surge through him.

 

 _‘You’re not at all like how you are on the internet’ 'Sorry, you're just nothing like what I'd thought you'd be.' ‘You can't get away with acting like a kid forever. Who do you think you are?’  'So you just act like that to get attention, is that it?' ‘'_ _Honestly, you’re kind of a disappointment in reality’_

 

 

“…Oh.”  

“I want to know who you really are.” Yuuri mumbled. Victor looked down at his feet in silence. “Can you tell me, what are you really like?” Yuuri slurred, tugging on Victor’s coat.

Victor warily watched the backs of the rest of their team as he and Yuuri slowly sauntered along, trailing behind them by quite a bit…

“…  I don’t think the real me is all that interesting.” He confessed, then almost immediately he regretted it. Yuuri took a deep breath.

“That’s okay. That’s exactly what I want to know, what it is that makes you yourself is interesting to me... Even if you’re boring, I want to know you.”

Viktor felt his heart react. He looked to Yuuri, his chest pounding. Yuuri was looking up tenderly at him, smiling sweetly, Yuuri's hand reached for Victor's.

An ache at Victor’s core eased its grip on him, just a little. A smile started to bloom across his lips, involuntarily, he didn’t even notice it until it had already happened. It felt like a breath of fresh air, and his cheeks felt warm with blush.

“Thank you.” he chuckled happily.

Yuuri smiled and stood on his own a little, perking up to beam at victor directly. Yuuri changed the subject, as if he were satisfied with that conversation now that he’d effectively charmed Victor.

 

“Hey, after the game jam is over, you wanna come with me to Japan? We can play video games and I can teach you figure skating and my parents will love you,”

“Why?”

“ ‘Cause you’re charming, you’re a handsome foreigner." Victor stole a glance at Yuuri. "And you can have pork katsudon and meet my dog and we can play games and hang out, no worries.”

“…That sounds very pleasant, I’ll take you up on that offer.”  Eating food, gaming and playing with a dog, and hanging out with Yuuri...

“Good. I’ll buy plane tickets.” Yuuri said, sounding not-so-serious. Victor chuckled.

Victor felt somewhat raw. And sentimental, maybe.

But it felt oddly good with Yuuri holding onto him like this. 

Yuuri was a very fascinating person.

They walked in silence except for their own breathing that turned into whisps of vapor in the cold night air. Yuuri’s drunken giggling the only other noise in his ear.

Victor was doomed, but at that moment he didn’t care.

 

It didn’t take too long for Victor to mostly sober up, but Yuuri passed out on the floor. Curled up under a table, his head on his bag, his coat pulled over him as a blanket. Yuuri’s fanboy from earlier took a photo of him, hoping that no one would notice.

Yurio was complaining about Yuuri, saying that they would have to get started in a couple hours and already they were one man down, chastising Yuuri for being irresponsible and a nuisance, even though those complaints fell on drunk, sleepy, deaf ears.

At least Yurio was passionate about this project, for once.

But Victor had a few things he needed to worry about before they could truly get started.

He didn’t want to pry. But he knew he needed to gauge Yuuri’s writing talent early in the process. He didn’t want to be biased, but he didn’t want have to drop him from the writing team after they’d gotten along, and Yuuri had been so…Well… But if that would be best for the team, then he didn’t have much of choice.

 

 

 

 

Yuuri woke up. His side and back sore. His hair a mess, he had the taste of alcohol on his breath.

Alcohol.

Then he remembered.

Memories came rushing back all at once; Getting drunk at the diner, saying all that stupid stuff, hugging victor and confessing that he wanted to know who he really was, and then passing out under this very table. Shit.

The game jam. Shit!

He fished around in his pockets of his coat for his phone, starting to panic that he’d lost it or it got stolen while he was drunk. He found it, and breathed a sigh of relief.

**1:49**

SHIT. The game jam had started without him! Almost two hours ago!

He scrambled to get out from under the table. He apologized loudly to anyone who would listen. He made off to the bathroom.

He texted Phichit, which, really, he probably should have done like at least five hours ago.

 

* * *

 

Yuuri: THIS TIME ON YUURI MAKES BAD DESCISIONS:

Yuuri:OK A LOT HAPPENED IN THE last 8 hours and I didn’t really have time to text you, I hope u turned your phone on silent so my notifications aren’t waking u up but holy hell

Yuuri: Ok a: Uh Victors on my team???

Yuuri: That’s a thing that’s happening

Yuuri: In case your wondering I somehow have not managed to totally freak him out or scare him off?? Idk maybe I did because

Yuuri: B: we went out for dinner and I ended up drinking too much

Yuuri: I didn’t get wasted? Per se? but I definitely said some things I REALLY wouldn’t  have.

Luckily my team seems pretty chill about it. HOWEVER

Yuuri: C: I just passed out from drinking and woke up 2 hours into the jam everyone’s hard at work I have done NOTHING

Yuuri: When i was talking with Victor (that also happened HAHAHA) he seemed cool but I just slept under a table and I was so ashamed I immediately ran into the bathroom to text u.

Yuuri: I should probably go talk to my team and apologize properly.

Yuuri: *~*

Yuuri: I’m gonna calm down and go apologize.

* * *

 Yuuri pocketed his phone.

 “Hey!”someone shouted. Yuuri turned towards the source of the voice. “What the hell are you doing?!”

“Yurio…”

“Uhg. that name. Whatever, just listen, you know you just spent the entire first two hours of the jam napping, right? You remember what happened at the diner?!”

“Y-yes?” Yuuri said, he was pretty sure he did anyway. Yurio suddenly stomped up to him, and shoved an accusing finger in his face.

“Well listen! I have a low tolerance level for this kind of bullshit! If you aren’t gonna pull your weight you shouldn’t have come to this jam in the first place! We don’t need two Yuris on this team! You haven’t even made anything in the past 5 months! And you have gotten jack shit done in the past 2 hours! I’m not going to allow any kind of slacking on your part or I’ll make sure you never make another video game for the rest of your life! If our game suffers because of you, you’re dragging all of our names through the mud, okay?! Got it MORON?” Yurio bared his teeth menacingly. He didn’t even wait for a response before he spit into the sink and then stomped out of the restroom.

Yuuri felt somewhat shaken at the sudden talking to he’d just gotten. But, to be fair he kinda deserved it.  Maybe it was because he was just a kid, but somehow he couldn’t take Yurio’s threat all that seriously. But, he was right about what he said.

Yuuri needed to pull his weight and prove his worth to this team. Especially if he gave up game design after this, he had to get serious.

He splashed his face with water and glared at himself in the mirror. He turned and walked out the door.

 He came back to his stuff, pulling his bag with his laptop out from under the table. Then he was startled by Victor's voice.

“Yuuri!” he called in a cheery tone.

“I’m so sorry.” Yuuri responded almost automatically, smacking his head on the underside of the table in an attempt to stand up quickly.

Victor just waved a hand and laughed dismissively.

“Don’t worry, We all need to sleep at some point, and we were the ones who let you get so drunk in the first place. But! you’ll have to pay us back by pulling an all-nighter for the rest of today. Anyway, I was going to say that I looked at some of your work and I’ve come to a decision about whether you will be on the writing team!”

A cold shock ran through him. He almost forgot. He wasn’t officially on the writing team unless Victor decided his writing was up to his standards.

“W-wait!” He put out his hands to stop whatever Victor would say next. Victor paused in the middle of opening his mouth to say something.

“…… Go on?” Victor prompted him.

“Uh. Um.” There was no way of stopping him. He’d already reached a decision, Yuuri knew that. He just needed to find a way for him to soften the blow “Just out of curiosity, what did you base it on?” Victor beamed at him.

“I wanted to play one of your games, but we’re hard pressed for time right now, so instead I read your short stories from your website!”

Yuuri’s blood ran cold. The _most_ recent one was almost 10 months old, and it was unfinished.

It wasn’t really meant to be read really… it was just filler that he put on the website for some reason. An idea for a game story that never panned out. He would have taken those down if he had the presence of mind to even update his website.

Victor put a hand on his shoulder, beaming at him.

 

 “Congrats! You’re on the writing team!”

 “…What.” Yuuri’s mind slowed to a stop. “Really?”

 “Yeah! I’ll look forward to working alongside you.” He squeezed his shoulder reassuringly.

“Why? You… those were...”

“True. They were a little rough around the edges; Poor word choices, stilted dialogue, repetitive word usage, a few unorganized plot points, but that, I can fix in post. I can refine what you give me. I can even teach you how to write a little better in the future. What’s really important is that you can pour your heart into it. It’s clear those characters and stories _mean something_ to you, Yuuri.

That’s the most I can ask from you. That you put everything you have into this project. That you show me _everything you are_ through your art.”

 

Then Victor’s fingers were sliding from his shoulder up his neck along sensitive skin. Yuuri didn’t dare move, his breath halted in his throat, he trembled under Victor’s touch. Victor gently took hold of his chin and guided his face so he was looking Victor in the eyes. Dazzling, blue eyes.

“Yuuri, can I ask you to do that for me?”

“Y-yes,” Yuuri’s face flushed.  

Viktor smiled at him in a way he didn’t quite comprehend. He looked satisfied, and he was so _attractive_. It made Yuuri squirm.

Victors fingers slid off of Yuuri’s face, Victor gently pushed a notebook into his hands with another sly smile, and walked away.

 

Yuuri felt like he was paralyzed for a good 2 minutes with a red tint on his face before he willed himself to actually look at what had been placed in his hand.

A notebook, open to a page of concept sketches for characters and lists.

Ah, okay.

The task at hand was what he was talking about. Okay.

Yuuri sat down and began studying Victor’s notes; Trying to avoid getting distracted by the hot feeling that was left where Victor’s fingers were.

His determination from earlier seemed to be a little side tracked, so he gave himself a second to cool off.

Okay.

Four characters for routes plus the main character.

He just had to break them down, and as victor had said, pour himself into them.

He always found it easiest to write stories centered around characters he could relate to. In these situations, he found ways to interpret these characters through the lens of his feelings.

Once he got caught up, he could join the others to continue planning and conceptualizing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING!!!


End file.
